What to Do if Plan A Looks like Plan F!

You’ve finally landed your dream job, adopted that foster child you knew was meant to be yours, moved to the big city leaving the small town behind, or finally made your way into the college of your choice. Plan A has been achieved and all is well. Or maybe not…

The thing in life about Plan A, if you’re so fortunate to find it, is that it does not answer all of life’s woes. There is very little in life that lives up to our expectations. Yes, I had to say that… Now, before you jump off that proverbial bridge of defeat realize this: whatever follows the failure of Plan A can often become so much better than what you had hoped for in the first place.

The dream job may challenge and stretch every part of your talents, but you just might discover some that you didn’t even know you possessed. That foster child who came with so much hurt, you may not be able to fill the gaping hole, but what you can do is love them deeply and offer hope. The big city makes you so very lonely and that dream college of yours has some courses you are drowning in… This might make you wonder why you ever chose this plan.

So what do you do?

First, feel free to curl up on the sofa with piles of junk food topped off by a pan of brownies joined by your best friend or your cat. Leave life behind to enjoy a movie marathon for an entire weekend if you like. You don’t have to figure this out right away.

After you do that for a self-prescribed amount of time (you can’t veg out forever), tackle this:

1. Decide whether Plan A was just your plan or the right plan.
2. Act upon that decision and be willing to shift.
3. Reevaluate what you need for execution—it may be different than you thought.
4. Commit. All plans require work, so commit to do what it takes.
5. Remember it is less talent and more tenacity that makes every plan work.

Plan A’s will evolve into every letter of the alphabet through your life’s journey. That job may lead to another more suited for you, but you would have never gotten there without the experience you gained from the first.

You don’t have to figure this out right away.

That child you loved so much through all of the hurt will leave your home to venture off into their own life, knowing you chose to show love when no one else did. The new city will build relationships that need you when you need them. And college, you will graduate, maybe with a different degree than you intended, but graduate nonetheless.

So start on Plan A, be ok when it becomes plan F, then just make it work. Live out your very own grit and grace life. Hindsight will make you really glad you did.

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Darlene, President of The Grit and Grace Project, is crazy enough to jump in the deep end then realize she may not have a clue where she’s landed. She has spent her adult life juggling careers in the music business, been an author, a video producer, and also cared for her family ... some days drowning, other days believing she’s capable of synchronized swimming.